


Feast of Fools

by Black_Betty



Category: Marvel, X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Carmen - Freeform, F/F, F/M, Feast of Fools, Genosha, Greek Mythology - Freeform, History, King Erik, Love at First Sight, Lust at First Sight, M/M, Oral History, Russian Folklore, Sexy Charles, Theatre, dance, pantomime, these tags are getting out of control, you should probably just ignore all of this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-22
Updated: 2013-03-22
Packaged: 2017-12-06 03:20:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/730927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Black_Betty/pseuds/Black_Betty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He hasn’t been to see a play…there is a chance he’s never been to see a play. His life before Genosha had been consumed with hardship and a nail-breaking, clawing, struggle for survival. He hasn’t had time for frivolities, for useless and impractical time wasting endeavors like music, or dance or the theatre. He sits back in his chair now, chin propped on one hand, one long leg crossed over the other, and prepares himself to endure.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Feast of Fools

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Sexy Dancer Charles](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/18946) by gabbia. 



> How is it possible that I can't write my papers, nor any of the WIPs I have going on, and yet somehow can spew out 3000 words of random fic in one night...I blame aesc and her plot bunnies over on tumblr, and especially gabbia's very inspirational and GORGEOUS art work, which you can see here:
> 
> http://gabbia.tumblr.com/post/45918775534/i-have-no-idea-why-i-drew-this-sexy-dancer
> 
> (also, I have resigned myself to the fact that I will forever be most comfortable writing in a semi-historical fantasy where Erik is King of somewhere...sorry everyone).

 

There are a million other things Erik should be doing right now. Important things. Discussions about politics and policy, security and battle strategy, of the humans on warships seen sailing around the southern coast, every day looking for new ways to breach their borders and violate Genoshan soil.

Instead, for some unknown reason, he is about to watch a play.

Well, that is not entirely true. He knows exactly how he ended up here and can place the blame securely on Emma’s shoulders. Emma, who had burst into his private quarters a week earlier and with words as sharp as her spiked boots, bemoaned the lack of any kind of culture in Genosha. The Arts weren’t something Erik had ever considered or really cared about, but Emma had made it clear in no uncertain terms that if Erik didn’t give her something to do besides guzzle wine in the long hours of the night with people who couldn’t drag their eyes away from her breasts, she would be holding him accountable.

“You can’t wear that helmet eternally, Erik,” she had threatened, “and though I can think of more than one person who would like to see you in tights, I’m sure you won’t appreciate performing a solo ballet during the next royal counsel.”

 So now he finds himself adjusting the stiff, high collar of his formal uniform, and arranging his cloak over the arms of a high-backed chair in the center of the infrequently used throne room. He is regretting leaving this entire ordeal in the hands of Emma and Janos who have lavished the room in silk and fur, and apparently invited the entire court, placing his chair atop a short stone dais so that everyone can gawk at him. When he glances at Emma, seated at his right hand in a waterfall of white feathers and strings of pearls, she smirks at him as though she knows the bitter train of his thoughts, despite the helmet.

He hasn’t been to see a play…there is a chance he’s never been to see a play. His life before Genosha had been consumed with hardship and a nail-breaking, clawing, struggle for survival. He hasn’t had time for frivolities, for useless and impractical time wasting endeavors like music, or dance or the theatre. He sits back in his chair now, chin propped on one hand, one long leg crossed over the other, and prepares himself to endure.

The room swells with noise as mutants from seemingly every corner of Genosha fill the seats on either side of Erik’s improvised throne, before being forced to crowd in and line the walls when all the seats are taken. Erik amuses himself by feeling out the bit and pieces of metal on each body, and wonders begrudgingly if maybe Emma has a point. There is genuine excitement lighting up the room, a bright joy that seems to pervade every corner, and Erik wonders if maybe he hasn’t considered the benefits of simple relaxation when it comes to building community and morale amongst his people.

He’s drawn from his thoughts as Janos parts the red velvet curtains that line the front of the makeshift stage and steps through. At his signal, Pyro gestures from where he’s lounging against the wall and with a flick of his fingers a flame rolls across the front of the stage, lighting up the line of torches fixed there. Always aware of his own aesthetics, Janos preens, the torchlight making the white of his suit glow, casting shadows in the hollows of his handsome face. The noise of the room is hushed as he raises an elegant hand, and then bows toward Erik, who rolls his eyes. From his vantage point, he’s sure he’s the only one who can see the man smirk, (Janos and Emma both love to force Erik into the monarchal role he never asked for), before he addresses the crowd, succinct as always:

“Brothers and Sisters, may I present to you: The Feast of Fools.”

Janos steps off the stage and is replaced by a tall, elegant woman, her dark skin off-set by the stark white of her hair loose around her shoulders, and the long flowing ivory dress that gathers around her bare feet. Erik is endlessly fascinated by the many variations of mutations he encounters daily as more of his people flee to join him under his newly won crown. This woman is beautiful--striking, but never more so than when her eyes cloud over a milky white and the room slowly fills with a cool damp fog at the curl of her fingers.

She explains in a penetrating, accented voice that traditionally, historically, the Feast of Fools was a chance for the low, the subjugated, to step across the class divide; to make a mockery of the aristocratic upper class through words and dance, pantomime and the power of the theatre.

There is some muttering from the crowd at her words. No one wants to be reminded of the fact that they were born of the same ancestry as the humans, but the woman speaks over the dissonant audience, voice as imposing as the spark of lightning that bursts forth from her fingertips, the echoing boom of thunder,

“We take this shared history and we make it our own. Now is our chance to transform the rich myth and fantasy of those who have oppressed our people, and revision it in our own image—in the mutant image.”

Her words ring through the room, and the changeable crowd is moved, impromptu applause breaking out. Erik thinks there might be more to this theatre thing than he initially thought. At the very least, this woman might have some use as an orator within the royal counsel.

And then the velvet curtain is drawn back and Erik can no longer think of strategy and politics and the heavy weight of the crown. For the time being, there is nothing else but The Feast.

He only vaguely recognizes the fairytales the actors are enacting, but he doesn’t need to know the references in order for his gaze to be fixed on the stage. The white-haired woman narrates regardless, spinning first the tale of a man who chases what he loves, but should never have: the seemingly untamable firebird.

A beautiful woman with dark hair steps out from behind the gathered curtains and casts a look over her shoulder. Emerging in her wake as though drawn by a spell, a young man follows. He chases her across the stage, and when he catches her, the audience shouts and gasps as she bursts into flame. But the man doesn’t let go, only pulls her closer and miraculously, isn’t burned. Together they start to dance as the narrator sings a beautiful, lilting melody in no language Erik as ever heard, the boy’s skin darkening, shifting, the girl’s flames caressing him, engulfing him until they burn together, two bodies becoming one in fluid motion.

The Narrator snaps her fingers and the room darkens, and when she allows the light in again, the firebirds are gone and in their place is a fan of golden feathers. From the back of the room, a high, clear voice begins to sing, and the audience turns away from the warm light of the stage to see a tall woman with gorgeous azure skin ambling through the crowd, the white of her teeth gleaming in the darkness.

“Meet Vertumnus,” says the Narrator, “who is about to fall in love.”

The singing Vertumnus steps onto the stage, her hair gleaming bright red in the lamplight, and the audience sighs in awe and appreciation when she stops in her tracks, as the golden feathers flutter and move, open to reveal themselves as wings, wings attached to an angel of a woman with gold skin and hair, and luminous eyes.

The crowd laughs as Vertumnus clowns and prances, and attempts to catch her lady’s eye, but the golden girl merely sits and plays a harp that pales in colour next to her skin. Finally the clever blue girl disguises herself as an old woman in order to endear herself and slip beneath the defenses of the lady, and Erik watches in childlike wonder as her skin clicks scale by scale into a new form, hunched and wrinkled, and painfully human.

Finally Vertumnus can reveal herself again, and wins a kiss, and Erik doesn’t think he’s ever seen anything as lovely as that mix of blue and gold, wings curling around to hide them from sight, and the crowd cheers and erupts into bawdy laughter when blue fingers part the feathers in order to wink at them one final time.

The Narrator lowers the lights again and waits until the crowd calms before continuing in the low light of the room, sure that her enraptured audience is hanging onto every smoothly spoken word,

“This last tale is not of true love, or laughter, but of passion, obsession and,” she claps her hands once over her head and there is another crack of thunder,

“Betrayal.”

A looming, clinging fog rolls in and with it three figures from opposite corners of the room. One is a huge, hulking man covered in remarkable blue fur, his footsteps light as he moves to the center of the stage regardless of his size. Another is a woman, covered from throat to toe completely in clinging black material so that she seems to move in and out of shadow, her coiled auburn hair streaked in white. The third wears a dark suit also, his black hair slicked back, his skin red, and he has a tail like a Christian devil. Indeed, he seems to play the part as the three meet on stage, the Devil flitting between the man and the woman as they face off, as they round each other like adversaries about to duel.

“We’re getting ahead of ourselves,” the Narrator intones, and the man and woman separate and move to opposite ends of the stage, “before blood, before the war, there is first,” and in a burst of smoke the Devil disappears, and then reappears with his arms around a hooded figure, just as the Narrator says,

“The Obsession.”

The Devil smiles revealing all his teeth, and disappears again, taking the hooded cloak with him, leaving a pale figure shrouded in smoke in his wake.

Through the smoke, the figure begins to dance, and Erik can hear the delicate jingle of jewelry, can see the smooth movement of hips. And like a slow seduction, finds himself entranced as more and more of the smoke dissipates and reveals a beautiful boy with dark hair, dressed in a loose shirt and silk trousers riding low on curving hips.

Erik wonders suddenly what his mutation is, and at that moment, Emma pokes him hard in the side. Hesitant to draw his eyes off the boy for even a moment as he lifts his arms and rolls his body, he mutters “what,” to Emma from the corner of his mouth, and is forced to glare at her when she pokes him again.

She gestures to his helmet and mouths “take it off,” and when he frowns and shakes his head resolutely “no,” she rolls her eyes and mouths “trust me.” He looks back to the stage where the boy is glancing at the blue furred man from under his eyelashes and licking his red mouth slowly, promisingly. Almost without thinking he raises his hands to his head and lifts the helmet, running a numb hand through his matted down hair before resting the helmet on his lap.

As soon as the helmet clears his forehead, the boy’s eyes snap to him, and he’s thankful now to be sitting down, as they surely would have knocked him over. He has never seen eyes so blue. Erik might think those eyes were his mutation, if not for the pulsating rhythm that now echoed through his head, the low growling beat of a song made of drums and a relentless classical guitar, and he can hear Emma’s smug voice in the corner of his mind saying,

 _he’s a telepath_ , but Erik doesn’t hear her, can’t pay attention to anything but how the boy’s body moves to the music he’s sharing with them, how perfectly in sync he is, as though the curl of his arms, the twist of his hips themselves were making up the pounding rhythm in his mind. Maybe they are.

There is some narrative being woven of a prostitute captured by a Soldier, and a seduction, but Erik can only see the heavy cuffs around narrow wrists as the boy is ‘arrested’, can feel the metal weighing down on delicate skin, and the pulse of blood beneath.

And the boy might be in chains, but he is no prisoner, using his bonds to pull his towering guard toward him, hand over hand. When they are flush against one another, he coils the chain around their bodies, turns and rolls the lush curve of his ass against the man until he groans. Erik can feel that groan echoed, guttural, in his own chest.  

Just when Erik thinks he can’t take it anymore, the blue furred Soldier digs his claws into the material of the boy’s loose shirt and tears it from his body just as the music crests and peaks. Erik jerks with the movement, feels a jolt of lust rush to his cock as miles of alabaster skin is revealed. The boy has a delicately jeweled collar at his throat and matching bands around the muscles of his upper arms, and when he turns to face his captor, tilting his head back to bare the long column of his throat, Erik can see a river of delicate golden chains running down the curve of his spine, can feel them against his skin like he’s is running his fingers there in a lover’s caress.

The Soldier eagerly unlocks the manacles around the boy’s wrists and the boy smiles, devastatingly, and loops the loose chain around the man’s neck, and draws him into a close embrace.

The story spins on, and the Prostitute, now free, returns to his home where his Lover is waiting for him. The boy and the woman in black engage in a dance of seduction that is both familiar and fraught with tension, the boy evading her grasp, her questions, the woman’s rage growing as she tires of the chase, the music throbbing in all their minds until finally, finally she catches him. One of her hands curls tightly around his wrist, raised in defiance, the other winds into the thick waves of rich dark hair at the back of his head, and the music wails and crescendos until their lips come together and—

It all stops. It is as though a light has been snuffed out, as though a body as died and its soul has fled out the open window. The boy sags in her arms, and she caresses one gloved hand carefully down his cheek and across the lurid red of his mouth. The audience is reeling, and Erik can hear whispers scuttling across the crowd behind him, but he’s too preoccupied by the void in his skull, the utter emptiness where there was once a living, breathing entity.

The woman lowers the boy’s body to the ground, and strokes his hair, and in that same moment the Devil reappears.

“Mischief,” the Narrator says as the Devil whispers in the Lover’s ear, her face growing stormy. As she rises and turns, heads off to confront the Soldier, Erik only has eyes for the supine body of the boy, pliant and loose in sleep, the curve of his waist, the curl of hair across his brow, and longs for the return of the boy’s presence in his mind.

As the Devil snaps back and forth, egging on the dueling adversaries, the boy rouses, and the audience sighs with relief as tentatively that beating pulse of music returns to their thoughts.

When he catches sight of the man and woman fighting, he rushes to them, he tries to stop them, and the three of them dance furiously, each pulling and pawing at the boy, spinning him back and forth. It is beautifully choreographed, the boy’s body moving effortlessly like water, and the long lines of his legs and arms seem to stretch endlessly to the corners of the stage. It seems interminable, the three of them balanced on the verge of combustion, and Erik is vaguely aware he is on the edge of his seat, but he can’t relax, or unclench his tightly wound fists. The music builds again, higher and higher, almost unbearably, and just as they crash into each other, seemingly about to tear the boy in two, the Devil appears in a flash, and grasps the boy around the waist, and spirits him away.

The man and woman fall to the ground in anguish, and there is only silence, and then darkness as the Narrator puts a finger to her lips and hushes at the lights until they dim, calms the distantly rolling thunder.

In the uncomfortable and awkward stillness of the darkened room, no one moves, no one makes a sound. Erik is still reeling from the absence of the boy in his head, so when the stage bursts into light again, the players emerging, grinning, from behind the curtain, and the room erupts into noisy applause, Erik welcomes it.

He senses that people are on their feet all around him, but he refuses to give Emma that much satisfaction, and remains seated. He can’t help but applaud just the same, and when the Narrator catches his eye, he nods in her direction, and accepts a bow in return. As he scans the assembled players, he sees the boy and the Devil are still missing, but at the same moment he recognizes it, there is a crack and a burst of movement, and they are suddenly standing directly in front of him. The Devil grins at him before he pops back on stage, looping an arm around the blue girl’s waist, leaving the boy standing in front of Erik, alone.

The boy kneels, and lowers his eyes, but just as on stage there is nothing submissive about him. This is not a pretty bird to be caught and kept, and yet still, Erik finds he wants to keep him. To lock him away from prying eyes and have him dance for Erik alone, to peel away that last layer of clothing, and leave him in only his jewels and gold chains. Too late he realizes that his helmet is still in his lap, but the boy doesn’t comment, doesn’t even flinch, only raises his hands and offers Erik a collection of blood red lilies.

When he looks up at Erik, however, there is a hint of mischief in his eyes when he says,

“A gift for your majesty.”

He is nearly drowned out by the renewed applause from the enthusiastic crowd as Erik reaches down to accept his gift, but there is no missing the dulcet voice in his mind whispering, _hello Erik_.

And when Erik thinks that maybe he could stand going to the theatre more often, above the noise of the crowd he can hear an echoing, infectious ring of laughter, and he cannot help but smile. 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> stuff you might be interested/not really care about at all!!
> 
> **I based the performance style off of theatre in the late middle ages, where the wealthy upper class would hire acting troupes to perform privately within their homes...this was something that kind of tapered off after the Tudor period, but as I just watched Anonymous, this was definitely inspired by that time frame...also, I was kind of inspired by the movie The Reckoning, and now that I think about it, maybe a little by kaydeefalls' amazing theatre AU "The Opposite of People" which you should probably go and read...
> 
> **the three acts are based (VERY ROUGHLY) off of the Firebird myth in Slavic folklore, the story of Vertumnus and Pomona from Roman mythology, and the opera Carmen by French composer Georges Bizet...the Feast of Fools existed just as Ororo describes during the medieval period, until it was inevitably condemned...they had a good run...you might remember it from the Hunchback of Notre Dame! I certainly did.
> 
> **all of the mutants within the acting troupe were stolen from the Marvel universe, though they might not be completely recognizable. The firebird was a mutant ACTUALLY CALLED FIREBIRD YOU GUYS, who's real name is Bonita Juarez, and Pomona was played by Lifeguard aka Heather Cameron, who I loved, and loved even MORE when she became gold and feathered.
> 
> okay I'll stop now. Thanks for reading! <3


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